You stated, in a letter about "Amos Barton," your willingness to accede to either plan, so I have no hesitation in expressing my wishes.
Letter to Miss Sara Hennell, 20th Oct. 1857.
"Open to conviction," indeed! I should think so. I am open to conviction on all points except dinner and debts. I hold that the one must be eaten and the other paid. These are my only prejudices.
I was pleased with Mr. Call.[56] He is a man one really cares to talk to—has thoughts, says what he means, and listens to what others say. We should quite like to see him often. And I cannot tell you how much I have felt Mrs. Call's graceful as well as kind behavior to me. Some months ago, before the new edition of the "Biographical History of Philosophy" came out, Mr. Lewes had a letter from a working-man at Leicester, I think, who said that he and some fellow-students met together, on a Sunday, to read the book aloud and discuss it. He had marked some errors of the press and sent them to Mr. Lewes for his new edition. Wasn't that pretty?
Letter to the Brays, 30th Oct. 1857.
"Conscience goes to the hammering in of nails" is my gospel. There can be no harm in preaching that to women at any rate. But I should be sorry to undertake any more specific enunciation of doctrine on a question so entangled as the "woman question." The part of the Epicurean gods is always an easy one; but because I prefer it so strongly myself, I the more highly venerate those who are struggling in the thick of the contest. "La carrière ouverte aux taléns," whether the talents be feminine or masculine, I am quite confident is a right maxim. Whether "La carrière ouverte à la Sottise" be equally just when made equally universal, it would be too much like "taking sides" for me to say.
There are only three entries in the journal for October.
Journal, Oct. 1857.
Oct. 9.—Finished "Janet's Repentance." I had meant to carry on the series, and especially I longed to tell the story of the "Clerical Tutor," but my annoyance at Blackwood's want of sympathy in the first part (although he came round to admiration at the third part) determined me to close the series and republish them in two volumes.
Oct. 22.—Began my new novel, "Adam Bede."